DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

July 12, 1849. SIR: I have examined and approved the instructions prepared for you in the General Land Office, and I desire information on all the matters therein named; but it is important that your report should come in prior to the termination of the next session of Congress, and you are charged with duties so extended and diversified, that you will probably not be able to make, in time, the detailed examination contemplated by those instruc

tions.

You will, however, obtain all the information in your power on all the subjects referred to therein; but direct your attention, in the first place, to the mode of creating titles to land, from the first inception to the perfect title, as practised by Mexico within the province of California; what kind of paper issued in the first instance, from what officer, when filed, and how and by whom recorded. So also with the subsequent steps, embracing the proceedings as to survey up to the perfecting of the title; and if there be record books, files, or archives of any kind whatsoever, showing the nature, character, and extent of these grants, endeavor to find and secure them, so that they may be placed in the hands of the acting governor of the Territory for safe custody and future reference. In descending to details, you will examine chiefly the larger grants, as the missions, and find whether the title to them be in assignees, or whether they have reverted and vested in the sovereign.

It is also understood that there are large grants, and grants of islands, keys, and promontories, points of great value to the public, which purport to have emanated just prior to the occupation of the territory by the United States, but which are probably fictitious and really entitled to a later date. These you will examine carefully, and note down fully all the information which can be had on the spot which will throw light on those when they shall be hereafter the subjects of investigation, stating the nature of the alleged title, whether purporting to be inchoate or complete. If there be any alleged grants of land covering a portion of the gold mines, you will also give to hat your careful consideration. It will be a question worthy of examinat.on when in the city of Mexico, whether in all grants in general, or in California in particular, there are not conditions and limitations, and whether there is not a reservation of mines of gold and silver, and a similar reservation as to quicksilver and other minerals.

It is also important in all large grants, or grants of important or valuable sites, or of mines, to ascertain whether or not they were actually surveyed and occupied under the government of Spain, or Mexico, and when publicity was first given to such grants, particularly as to such as are of a suspicious or doubtful character.

This department has no authority to pay you anything on account of your services; but you will be paid out of the contingent fund of the General Land Office a sum sufficient to cover your expenses while in California, and also your necessary expenditures in procuring information, and finding and putting in a place of security any books of records of land titles or other archives relating thereto, for which your drafts, not exceeding twenty-five hundred dollars in the whole, accompanied by a letter stating the special objects to which it has been, or is about to be, applied, will be duly honored.

You will be pleased to keep an account of your personal expenses, and

also of the expenditures required in the execution of your duties, and make a rendition of the same to this department, to which, as to titles, &c., in California, you will make your report; and in reference to your examinations in Mexico you will make a separate communication to the State Department, a notice of which should be given in your report to this department. An application will be made by the department to Congress for an appropriation as an allowance to you of a fair compensation for your

services.

Wishing you a pleasant voyage, and health and success in your arduous. undertaking,

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

WM. CAREY JONES, Esq.

T. EWING.

MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA,
September 30, 1849.

DEAR SIR: I arrived here on Monday night two weeks since, after a passage of twenty days from Panama. The old archives are here, and I commenced immediately the investigations with which I am charged. Gen. Riley promptly gave directions for all the archives to be open to me; and I hope to be able to make a pretty full report, and with as much despatch as we had originally supposed possible. The archives, however, are very imperfect, and in confusion: so much so, that I think a competent person ought to be employed to go over them, sheet by sheet,. and collate and arrange them. I do not find any book of records earlier than 1839. The two which I understood from you Col. Mason spoke of, extend from that year to the close of 1845. Whether any book was commenced for 1846 I have not learned; but hope to do so when at Los Angeles, where all the records were at that time kept, and the persons who were employed in the public offices reside. In the hurried reading which I gave to Mr. Halleck's report previous to leaving, I did not observe what is stated in a note of Col. Stevenson's in the appendix, namely: that "two large boxes, said to contain the archives of the Departinental Assembly," were delivered to Commodore Stockton in August, 1846, and "supposed to have been put on board the Congress.' The records of the Departmental Assembly are particularly deficient, and the above suggestion may account for it. I would suggest that Commodore Stockton be applied to for information. His reply might possibly reach me from the department and be of use to me before I shall be ready to leave.

There is one thing in regard to grants in this country which will call for more liberal legislation than Congress has hitherto accorded, in confirming grants in territories acquired from foreign powers. I allude to the size of the grants. They are nearly all large. The Mexican colonization laws, under which the bulk of the grants have been made here, allow as high as eleven sitios (eleven leagues square) to be granted to individuals. In many instances the full privilege has been used, and there are very few grants, under those laws, of less than two sitios, while four, five, six, eight, and ten, are quite common.

Touching politics, I found a convention in session here, engaged on precisely the work which I suppose will meet your views-forming a State constitution. The convention will finish its work this week, and, I believe,

hope to have their Senators and Representatives elected ready to send everything up to you by the steamer which leaves the 1st December. I find there is no lack of candidates for the high offices. A number of persons seem to have come out during the past summer, with no other view than to go back with a title to four thousand miles of mileage in their pockets.

If I should find a good opportunity to exchange the bill, I shall take the liberty of drawing upon you, by the present steamer, for the sum of one thousand dollars. I hope still to keep within the sum (fifteen hundred dollars) for which you originally proposed to give me authority to draw.

Very respectfully, sir, your obedient servant and friend,

Hon. Mr. EwING,

WM. CAREY JONES.

Secretary of the Interior.

OCTOBER 1.

DEAR SIR: I have only drawn by this steamer for two hundred dollars, having received the money here and appropriated it. I shall have to draw in the course of this month for probably eight hundred more.

Yours, truly,

WM. CAREY JONES.

Report on the laws and regulations relative to grants or sales of public lands in California, by H. W. Halleck.

HEADQUARTERS 10TH MILITARY DEPARTMENT,

MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA, April 13, 1849. GENERAL: I have the honor to transmit herewith a report of brevet Captain H. W. Halleck, acting Secretary of State, on the laws relating to lands and mission property in California..

I would call the attention of the government particularly to the representations made in this report respecting the claims of individuals to lands required for government purposes, and the spurious titles to lands which evidently belong to the public domain. Much of the land thus held by titles at least very doubtful, if not entirely fraudulent, has been divided up and sold to speculators, who will endeavor to dispose of it to the new settlers at exorbitant profits. And as disputes are daily arising between the different claimants, I deem it exceedingly important to the peace and prosperity of California that measures be immediately taken for the speedy and final settlement of these titles upon principles of equity and justice.

I am, respectfully, your obedient servant,
R. P. MASON, Colonel 1st Dragoons.

Brigadier General R. JONES,
Adjutant General U. S. A., Washington.

STATE DEPARTMENT OF THE TERRITORY OF CALIFORNIA, Monterey, March 1, 1849. SIR: In compliance with your instructions, I have collected together and examined all archives of the government of California which can be found, and have the honor to report as follows:

1st. On the laws and regulations which govern the granting or selling of public lands in California.

2d. On the laws and regulations respecting the lands and other property belonging to the missions of California.

3d. On the titles of lands in California which may be required for fortifications, arsenals, or other military structures, for the use of the general -government of the United States.

The translation of the laws are made by Mr. W. E. P. Hartwell, the government translator, and are almost literal versions of the original. Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

Colonel R. B. MASON,

H. W. HALLECK,

Brevet Captain and Secretary of State.

Commanding 10th military department, and Governor of California.

1st. Laws and regulations governing grants or sales of public lands in California. The first authority for granting lands in Upper California is · contained in the viceroy's instructions to the commandant of the "New Establishments of San Diego and Monterey," dated August 17, 1773. By articles 12, 13, 14 and 15 of these instructions, the commandant is empowered both to designate common lands, and to grant titles to individuals, whether Indians or new settlers, in the vicinity of the missions or pueblos. He might also, if he deemed it expedient, change any mission into a pueblo, and subject it to the same civil and economical laws as governed the other pueblos of the kingdom.-(Vide appendix No. 1.)

On the 21st of September, 1774, the viceroy wrote to the commandant in Upper California, granting permission to the soldiers of the garrisons to marry the baptized Indian girls of the missions, and authorizing the assignnient of lands to the soldiers so marrying. The first grant of this kind was that of a piece of land in Carmel Valley, of one hundred and forty varas, to Manuel Butron, who had married an Indian girl of the mission of San Carlos.

In order better to carry out the wishes of the Spanish government in reference to the establishment of depots of provisions, &c., in Upper California, for refreshing the Spanish vessels from the East Indies, and to furnish supplies to the garrisons of the presidios, directions were sent by the viceroy to Governor Neve in June, 1777, to establish two pueblos, one on the "Rio Guadalupe," and the other on the "Rio Porcincula," and to portion out ground to the new publadores, or colonists.

On the 1st of June, 1779, the governor drew up a set of new regulations for the government of California, which was approved by the King in a royal order of October 24, 1781. Title 14 of these regulations contains instructions respecting colonization, and the government of the new colonists. Each publador was to receive a bounty of $116 44 per annum for the first two years, and $60 per annum for the next three years; and also was to have the loan of horses, mules, cattle, farming utensils, &c. The streets, squares, municipal and common lands of the pueblos, and the

solares or house-lots, and suertes of sowing lands of the publadores, wereto be designated by the government.

Discharged soldiers were to receive building and planting lots, the same as the colonists. All the publadores were to possess the right of pasturing their cattle and of cutting wood on the common lands of the pueblos. Certain conditions were to be attached to these grants of land, such as the building of houses, planting of trees, &c., within a specified period of time.-(Vide appendix No. 2.)

These regulations, with slight modifications, have formed the basis of the laws which have ever since governed the pueblos of California.

On the 22d of October, 1791, orders were sent to Governor Romeu authorizing the captains of presidios to grant and distribute house-lots and lands to the soldiers and citizens within the extent of two common leagues in every direction from the centre of each presidio square.-(Vide appendix No. 3.)

Immediately after the independence of Mexico, and during the government of Iturbide, a system of laws was established for colonization, dated April 11, 1823; but as these laws were suspended almost immediately afterwards, it is believed no grants of land were made under them in Upper California. On the 18th of August, 1824, the constituent congress passed a decree for the colonization of the territories of the republic, which decree was limited and defined by a series of regulations, dated November 21, 1828.

By these laws and regulations the governors (gefes politicos) of territories were authorized to grant (with certain specified exceptions) vacant lands to contractors, (empressarios,) heads of families, and private persons. The grants to empressarios for colonies or towns were not to be valid till approved by the supreme government.

Nor were grants made to individuals or single families to be held as definitively valid, till approved by the territorial deputation; and if the territorial deputation should not give its approval, the governor was to refer the documents to the supreme government for its action.

But, without the previous approval of the supreme government, no territorial governor could make grants of land within ten leagues of the seacoast, nor within twenty leagues of the boundaries of any foreign power. Moreover, the general government reserved to itself the right to make use of any portion of these lands for the purpose of constructing warehouses, arsenals, or other public edifices which it might deem expedient for the defence or security of the nation. The maximum and minimum amounts of land which could be given to any one person were specified, and also the circumstances under which the grant should becême void.-(Vide appendix Nos. 4 and 5.)

These laws and regulations are believed to be still in force, as they are referred to in the titles to lands granted in Upper California as late as July 8, 1846. The usual form of a confirmation of a grant of land by the territorial legislature, is as follows: "The grant made to N, of the place called in the jurisdiction of, comprising sitios of large cattle, (square leagues,) is approved according to the title given to him on the of, 184, in conformity with the law of the 18th of August, 1824, and the 5th article of the regulations of the 21st of November, 1828. "A. B., President of the Departmental Assembly.

"C. D., Secretary.”